1. The Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to the field of information services available via mobile communications links and, more particularly, to improvements in delivering and presenting information to mobile communications devices.
2. Background and Relevant Art
In the telecommunications industry, several advances have been made to facilitate the convergence of computing and telephone capabilities. For example, it is now common for mobile telephones and other mobile communications devices to be equipped with displays and browsers to enable access to the Internet and other network repositories.
The utility of such a communications device is well appreciated. For example, such devices can enable a user to access their email or other messages, even while they are traveling. Other information, such as, but not limited to, financial reports, weather, sporting reports and news can also be accessed on a mobile communications device while a person is traveling, such as, for example, by using the mobile communications device to connect to the Internet or other available networks.
Although the ability to access information remotely and on the move can be advantageous, for at least the reasons mentioned above, the portability of some mobile communications devices inherently limits the display and navigation capabilities for presenting the information that is obtained. In particular, the size constraints of some mobile telephones and PDAs can restrict the amount of information that can be properly displayed at any given time. For example, existing mobile communications devices can typically only display a relatively limited amount of information as compared to, for example, a desktop computer monitor. Accordingly the amount of information and the type of information that is displayed on a mobile communications device is restricted to the browser and display capabilities of the mobile communications device, rather than on the preferences of the user or the relevance of the information that is be displayed at any particular time.
To help overcome some of these limitations, a user can utilize an Internet service, such as Microsoft's MSN Mobile, to customize a PC-based webpage to help focus and control the presentation of information that is accessed and displayed by the mobile communications device when the mobile webpage is accessed. For example, a PC-based personalized webpage can enable a user to select various types of news reports, financial reports, sporting reports, weather reports, and other information that they want to be presented when they access their personalized mobile webpage. By doing this, a user can have some control over the information that is presented on their mobile communications device. However, because of the restrictive display and browse capabilities of the mobile communications devices, as described above, the presentation of the desired information can still be presented in some unsatisfying or undesired way.
Furthermore, because people traditionally use telephones differently than they use their computers, users may not want to access the same information on their telephones as they do on their computer. Accordingly, a customized webpage that is intended for computer web access can include more information than a person wishes to access or navigate through on their telephone. This is particularly true when considering that accessing Internet information over a telephone can sometimes cost a user more than the same access on a computer, depending on the user's phone plan.
Yet another reason why a user may wish to access different information with their telephone than they do with their computer is because most telephone devices do not have the advanced navigation affordances that are provided by most computers, such as, for example, full size keyboards, and so forth.
Accordingly, although the ability to access information through a mobile communications device can be useful, it is not always practical or desirable to access information on a mobile device in the same way as on a traditional computer. Instead, it is typically more desirable to access more focused and relevant information so that a user does not have to waste valuable time and resources (e.g., power resources) trying to find desired information. This is even more true when a user is traveling between cities, states, or even countries, because the information they are seeking may be contextually relevant only to the location or time in which they are seeking the information. Therefore, what is needed in the industry are improved methods and systems for presenting information for mobile communications devices in desirable and contextually relevant ways.